


seven for a secret never told

by thegirl



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Burying the body, F/M, Gen, Stark family feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-27
Updated: 2016-08-27
Packaged: 2018-08-11 08:14:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,904
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7883530
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thegirl/pseuds/thegirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jon has always known, in the back of his mind, that he’d do anything for his family. But he’d never thought he’d actually be here – here, being an abandoned Northern moor at 3 in the morning, knee deep in swamp as he pushes a corpse beneath the murky water.</p><p>He feels like he should have hesitated more than he did, should have been torn, but he wasn’t. It was easy. It was Sansa’s wobbling voice over the telephone and Arya’s swearing in the background, and that he was the first one that they called. He didn’t even think about it before he was leaving his apartment, Ygritte still softly snoring, with a shovel in the trunk of his car.</p><p> </p><p>Wherein, the Starks have got to make a body disappear, a murder not-happen, and have to calm down their irate mother. Sometimes, Jon really hates his siblings.</p>
            </blockquote>





	seven for a secret never told

**Author's Note:**

> This is a modern AU (obviously), and I've included the Uni and High School tags, because that's roughly the age the Starks are - Jon didn't go to Uni, instead joined the Watch, Robb is currently going (until he meets Jeyne, anyway) and Sansa, Arya and Bran are all in high school.
> 
> The song I'm referencing in the title and in the car is Magpie by The Unthanks. It's a great song, modelled off of the British nursery rhyme:
> 
> One for sorrow,  
> Two for joy.  
> Three for a girl,  
> Four for a boy.  
> Five for silver,  
> Six for gold,  
> Seven for a secret never told.

Jon has always known, in the back of his mind, that he’d do anything for his family. But he’d never thought he’d actually be here – here, being an abandoned Northern moor at 3 in the morning, knee deep in swamp as he pushes a corpse beneath the murky water.

He feels like he should have hesitated more than he did, should have been torn, but he wasn’t. It was easy. It was Sansa’s wobbling voice over the telephone and Arya’s swearing in the background, and that he was the first one that they called. He didn’t even think about it before he was leaving his apartment, Ygritte still softly snoring, with a shovel in the trunk of his car.

Jon doesn’t ask how it happened. He doesn’t ask how Joffrey Baratheon ended up twisted and bloody and stiff, green eyes staring blankly at the night sky. He doesn’t ask who did it, or how. Robb shows up later, Bran on the phone from home but not able to come in person due to the uneven ground. Robb shows up later, when Jon has already gotten rid of the blood, the body, the weapons, the motive.

Robb shows up later, and doesn’t have to do it, doesn’t have to know just how much it _doesn’t_ bother him, and how much that scares him, and Jon hates him a little bit for it.

Jon should be falling apart. Should be in pieces. But his hands are sure and strong and still, and Arya is much the same, the only evidence that she’s even slightly upset being the way she’s biting her nails.

Sansa is red eyed, with a puffy face from crying, wracked with sobs and remorse and gods knows what else. Robb cradles her, hushing their sister who wasn’t made for this kind of night, the kind that changed everything, and Jon envies and pities them in equal measure, his siblings who were not made of the same stuff as he.

“Lets get you cleaned up,” he says roughly as he folds Sansa into the backseat, and she stares with half-lidded eyes at the swamp. Arya gets shotgun, and turns on a folk music station. She nods her head at the haunting melody, _one for sorrow, two for joy._ Robb makes his way back to his motorbike, and follows them all the way back home.

.

Catelyn Stark is waiting in the kitchen.

Because, of course she is. Ever since he moved out, Jon and she have valiantly avoided one another at every social gathering they were both required to attend as Lord Commander and Lady Stark respectively. He can count the number of words they have said to each other in the past four years on one hand.

But it appears that strategy is at an ends as he half drags Sansa in through the back entrance with Robb at her back, Arya at the back of the group, watching for any cameras or possible witnesses. The journey from the swamp, which usually took five minutes, took fifty on their ride home as they avoided every convenience store with CCTV, every main road and every busy area of nightlife.

“You,” she all but snarls at Jon, still sending a shiver down his spine even in her blue dressing gown, before her face drops into worry as she catches sight of Sansa, “oh gods, what have you done?!” Jon doesn’t even have it in himself to be outraged at the assumption.

Jon lets go of Sansa’s practically dead weight as her mother drags her to her side. Sansa squints at the bright lights of the overhead lamp, and her pupils are huge and black. “Sansa?” Catelyn pats her daughter’s cheek, and the girl smiled in a way that looked almost drunk – manic and slow.

“Mum, leave him ‘lone.” She mumbles as she settles herself on a stool. Against the black leather of the seat, her hands are as white as lilies. “Not his fault.” She rests her forehead on the kitchen island, gently, gently, and once her cheek is pressed completely against the black marble, she begins to cry silently.

Catelyn sends him a look of vitriol, and in doing so catches sight of Arya as she quietly closes the backdoor. “What is going on? You look like you’ve been- like you’ve been in the swamp!”

Arya nibbles at her nails. “We were, mum. Just went out for a- for a bonding trip. My idea. Last minute.”

Lady Stark looks like she has no idea who to scream at first. Robb stands, playing with his hands (his clean, clean hands) and Arya looks at the floor, and Jon blinks and looks her right in the eyes, knowing he is covered in swamp water, mud and grime, and tracking it through her new kitchen.

Of course she picked him.

“This was your idea,” she hisses, pointing a finger at him, “You always get my children into trouble. None of them would do this on their own, you’re a bad influence and always have been, I told you never to return to this house when your father died and I meant it, you little-”

“’Top, Mum.” Sansa whispers from the kitchen island, but her mother pays her no mind.

“Leave,” Catelyn snaps, “leave now, and don’t you ever come back. Your father may have felt he had to keep you around but I don’t, and you have intruded enough on our lives-”

“Mum, it was my idea.” Arya insists, hands away from her mouth now, and she steps between her mother and Jon. “It wasn’t Jon. He wasn’t even there until the end when I called him to pick us up, as we got lost in the dark. Robb was with us all night.”

Catelyn looks sharply at her eldest son. “You were?”

“I was. All night.” Robb says, sounding so sure that Jon knows that she’ll believe him, her darling boy, who would never lie.

Catelyn’s nostrils flare. She looks back at Sansa, who still has tears tracking down her cheeks, pooling into a little, growing patch of wetness on the work surface. “What happened to her?”

“I, um, think-” Robb stutters, searching for an answer.

“I took a pill,” Sansa mumbles, and Jon can’t help but stare at her. The lie is obvious. Sansa would never drink more than a sip of champagne at weddings, let alone taking drugs. But somehow, somehow, she keeps going with the lie, lifting her head off of the table, swaying slightly as she tried to meet her mother’s gaze dead on. “It was something Margaery’s brother gave me, he told me that it let him get away from things for a while, just, feel free, you know? I was- I was bored in the swamp with Robb and Arya, and I just- I just took it. I didn’t think it’d be like this. Jon came to get me when it got bad. Don’t be mad at him, or Arya or Robb. It’s all my fault. I’m never, ever doing this again, mummy.” At that last word her eyes filled with fresh tears and she began sobbing madly. “I’m so sorry, daddy would be so disappointed in me. It’s just been so- so hard since he... I’m sorry, I’m sorry...”

Jon had always assumed Sansa got the lead at the school play’s because the drama teacher had a crush on her. He was wrong. This was Oscar worthy stuff.

Lady Stark melts. Her expression is torn between anger and worry, finally settling on the latter. She starts murmuring comforts to her eldest daughter, and Jon doesn’t need any more opportunity to back out than that.

.

“ _Come round the back,”_ Bran’s voice crackles on loudspeaker, having called the moment that Jon had escaped back to his car, “ _you need to change.”_

He wasn’t wrong, Jon realized, and sighed, before sneaking down the backalley, through the rockery and around the glass gardens to the back of the house. Bran’s room is lit up, and Jon can see his brother’s auburn hair glinting in the artificial light. “ _Mum’s just gone to tuck Sansa in,”_ Bran tells him, “ _you can get in through the servant’s entrance.”_

Not for the first time, Jon is reminded of how much he loves Winterfell. Built whilst the Starks of old still had an army of staff, half the rooms have been converted into dens, playrooms, cinemas and dance studios. But even a family of six children couldn’t completely fill up the massive castle, making it much easier to sneak in after a wild night without notice, as most of the servant’s rooms were abandoned.

They still had a few staff: Jory, head of security (who the children had an agreement with about turning the other way when they needed to sneak back in, as it was more trouble for both him and them), Maester Luwin, a private tutor, and Old Nan, who was technically their nanny, but she had been their father’s nanny as well, and his father’s nanny too. She was more of a dear family friend, who they housed in payment for her years of loyal service, and she told wicked stories of Others, goblins, princesses, knights and dragons. But Old Nan had her own quarters in the big house, Jory lived in a house on the grounds, and Maester Luwin didn’t work all the time, just dropping by when any one of the kids had dropped behind a little in lessons, or was particularly interested in something that their school didn’t cover.

Jon knows where all the squeaky floorboards are, knows that he has to abandon his wellingtons by the door to avoid leaving heavy, muddy footprints on the stairs, and yet, his heart is still pounding by the time he reaches Bran’s door. He goes to knock, but it swings open before he has the chance, and Jon thankfully rushes inside.

Bran’s cheeks are flushed, and to Jon’s surprise, he’s grinning. Jon doesn’t think he’d have been grinning if he was there, but to Bran, this is probably the most exciting thing that’s happened to him since the accident. Jon remembers when he was little, he'd climb all over Winterfell, pretending he was James Bond on a secret recon mission. “Nobody saw you?” his little brother whispers.

Jon shakes his head, trying to get his breath back. “Nobody.” He confirms.

“I’ve got some stuff that should fit you,” Bran says, wheeling himself over to his chest of drawers, drawing attention to fact that he’s still dressed in his pyjamas.

“You got yourself out of bed on your own?” Jon says, unable to keep the surprise out of his voice. For a moment, he fears Bran will take offense. He had been angry for a long time, as anyone would be, for things that he’d done without thinking before becoming almost impossible.

But thankfully, Bran just smiles. “Mother thinks I’m still an invalid,” he scoffs, “like once I’m in bed I can’t get up if I really want to.”

Jon’s mouth twitches as Bran puts immaculately folded clothes into his arms. “I won’t look,” his brother says, “but be quick. We can’t be too obvious, or even Jory will start asking questions, looking at his tapes.”

Jon almost smacks himself on the forehead. “Jory’s tapes!” he hisses. Although he knows the jovial man wouldn’t rat them out to Lady Stark, if the police come calling, he’d give them up for inspection, and then god knows what they’d find.

“I’m on it,” Bran says, “don’t worry. By morning, they’ll show what we need them to.”

Jon doesn’t need to hide the relief and admiration in his voice as he says, “Thanks, Bran. You’re really saving our asses.”

Bran shrugs, but his cheeks go a little pink. “What is family for?”

.

“Where’d you go last night?” Ygritte asks the next morning, as Jon cooks breakfast. He tries not to tense up - he'd hoped she wouldn’t notice, but expected she would.

“Arya wanted to do some family bonding in the swamp,” he said as dryly as possible, “and shockingly, they got stuck, so I had to go and help them out.”

“Uh huh,” Ygritte said, pouring out two cups of coffee, “good story. If I didn’t know you so well, I’d believe it.” She presses a piping black coffee into his hands, and raises her eyebrow. “What actually happened?”

Jon takes a sip of the coffee, and winces. Too bitter. He puts two spoonfuls of sugar in, and stirs. “It’s better if you don’t know,” he tells her, “the police are watching you closely as it is. When... what happened last night comes out, you can’t know anything.”

Ygritte nods slowly, “Plausible deniability?”

Jon gives her hand a squeeze, relief flooding through him that she won’t force him to lie to her. “Exactly. When it all dies down... I’ll tell you all of it. I promise.”

Ygritte kisses his cheek, and shoves her keys in her pocket, before going to pull on her jacket that identifies her as part of the _Wildling Protest Group,_ or more specifically, third-in-command of the highly controversial organization. “See you tonight, crow.”

Not for the first time, Jon thinks about the ring in his sock drawer. _Soon_ , he promises himself. _Soon_.

.

Three days later, the news breaks that Joffrey Baratheon is missing. His and Sansa’s highly publicized break up (due to abuse, but that doesn't make it into the papers until months after his 'disappearance') lands all eyes on her, but Sansa does an admirable job of looking bereaved and shocked. His mother is out for blood, pointing the finger at Sansa, Margaery, Ros and any other girl that he’s been even vaguely linked with.

There’s no knocks on the door. No police come to his apartment. Sansa gets interviewed by the police, but they assure her it’s just policy, and Arya too, because in the past she’s beaten Joffrey up after finding out what he was doing to her sister behind closed doors. Jon thinks it's a member of the police who actually leak the abuse to the press, but he can't be sure. Either way, Sansa's 'drug' taking didn't get leaked, which leads him to believe it was a sympathetic party.

After those first two interviews, establishing alibis – Arya tells them about the ‘bonding’, which raises no eyebrows, as Sansa copies it, and Robb is under no suspicion whatsoever considering he’s the son of the First Minister of the North, and has grown up in the spotlight as the darling of grandmothers and tweenage girls everywhere, Rickon is _nine_  and Bran is the poor little boy in the wheelchair. Jon doesn’t even get a look in – he has no public presence, no reason to kill Joffrey, and the boy's last text was to Margaery Tyrell, asking for nudes (and not getting them).

Jory never asks about the tapes, or what they might show. Bran did as he said, and fixed it that way so nothing suspicious would put eyes on them. Ygritte has figured it out, Jon thinks, but he won’t confirm her thoughts, and she won’t ask just in case she’s right. The investigation continues, focus turning to the Tyrells. Margaery has an alibi, as do her two older brothers, but Loras has none.

He claims he was with a friend, who he later admits was a lover, but won’t name them. Any idiot could see that he was so deeply closeted he would choose prison over being outed, and Jon would bet good money that the ‘friend’ he was seeing was Renly Baratheon, Joffrey’s uncle. He technically has a motive - the nudes text - and the prosecution hypothesises that he wanted revenge for his sister's honour being questioned. In the end, the police can’t prove that Loras killed Joffrey, but Loras’ team can’t disprove it either with Loras refusing to back up his alibi with a name. A pall follows the man for years, Cersei Lannister alternating between him and her own brother, Tyrion, as the murderers – even though Tyrion’s alibi was airtight, as he’d been filming a talk show in America at the time.

Finally, the investigation closes. Jon supposes they’ll never find the body, that whatever was left of the horrid boy is, by now, simply bones. Arya gets into dance school, and perfects her ‘water dancing’, as she calls it, landing a role in Braavos a couple of years later, in a production choreographed by the legendary Syrio Forel. Sansa releases a baking book, crediting cooking with helping her overcome Joffrey’s abuse, and has a baking show off the back of the book's success. Bran finds a new passion in programming, coming up with more and more complex programs, until he gets hired by a shadowy corporation to... well, nobody’s quite sure what he does. He’s not allowed to tell them, it’s in his contract. Robb elopes with Jeyne, a nursing student, and disappears to France for a few years, being so romantic with flowers, chocolates and candlelit dinners all over his facebook that Jon wants to hurl. Jon proposes to Ygritte, and manages to restrain himself from copying his brother’s example by actually having a wedding ceremony, although it is only four weeks after he proposed.

It still counts, dammit Arya.

(He tells Ygritte all of it on their honeymoon at Hardhome. _Who actually killed him?_ She asks, more curious than condemning. Jon shrugs, _does it matter?_ )

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoyed this, please consider leaving a comment and kudos, it means a lot to me! If you have any questions, just ask, and I'll try to clear it up for you :)


End file.
